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The political situation in Iraqi Kurdistan is deteriorating day by day. Kurdistan Regional Government announced in early 2016 that it would cut government employee salaries by 15 to 75 percent, depending on position and salary bracket, as part of austerity measures to deal with the ongoing economic crisis.

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Kurdish forces retreated from Afrin in northern Syria on 19 March after Turkey seized control of the centre of the city.On 25 March Turkish state media said they had full control of the city and were now “sweeping for landmines and IEDs to allow citizens to return.”

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Lively and disruptive protests took place on Sunday 11 March at Kings Cross and Manchester Piccadilly rail stations, blocking the track in Manchester and closing King’s Cross.

They have pushed the Turkish military assault on Kurdish-held Afrin in Syria back into the headlines.While a siege on the enclave of Eastern Ghouta has dominated much press coverage, what has happened in Afrin has been just as brutal.

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Turkey’s incursion and bombing campaign in Kurdish controlled area of Afrin is a worrying escalation in a prolonged stand-off on the Syrian border.

Erdogan’s hostility to the expanding territory now under the control of Kurdish forces has been held back by the support of both Russia and the US for the Kurdish forces. But as relations have thawed between Turkey and Russia, the dynamic has changed.

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Muhsin Kareem from the Worker Communist Party of Kurdistan spoke to Solidarity about the situation in Kirkuk.

What has happened since the Iraqi army came into Kirkuk on 16 October?

The situation right now in Kirkuk is not one of a complete occupation; the city is look like to operate normally. But despite of Hashd Al- Sha’abi is now not in Kirkuk itself and deployed in outskirts, but the people are very worried and many have left especially the Kurds.

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Over 100,000 Kurds have fled Kirkuk since the Iraqi army and the Hash’d al-Shaabi militia seized control of the territory, in the face of an overwhelming vote for an independent Kurdistan.

Kirkuk is of great importance for both Kurds and the Iraqi government. Its oilfields would have made any potential Kurdish state economically viable and allow it to quickly establish international trade links. Few oilfields now remain in the hands of the Kurdish peshmerga fighters.

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Iraqi government forces and Shia militias have occupied Kirkuk for the first time since 2014, the year Daesh made their away across Iraq. Although Kirkuk is not part of Iraqi Kurdistan it has been under the control of Kurdish forces. In the September referendum it voted by a sizeable majority in favour of independence.